Given that campaigns must last at least 37 days, the latest date Prime Minister Stephen Harper could start this year’s would be September 13. Neither his office nor the Conservative Party responded to requests for comment. The Tories have a major rally planned for Montreal on Sunday night, the CBC reported.
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In addition, the first leaders’ debate, organized by Maclean’s magazine, will be held next week, and the airwaves and social-media feeds are already cluttered with electoral messages.
Robert Wolfe, a Queen’s University professor and former government trade negotiator, said representatives from the other countries at the bargaining table are aware of Canada’s election schedule. “We’re getting close”.
“A long campaign financially exhausts the other parties”, said one person familiar with Conservative strategy.
Still, party spokesmen emulated Mr. Harper, who refused to lay out his exact plans for the writ drop.
“I don’t speculate, and I particularly don’t speculate on my own actions”, Harper told Bloomberg.
But there’s no fixed length on how long the election campaign could be, only how short – no less than 37 days long including the day it begins. On Wednesday, Harper told Bloomberg News that the date was set in stone, although he stayed coy about when he would ask the Governor General to call an election.
There would be clear financial implications to an early election call.
The Conservatives have a larger donor base than their rivals and raised C$6.3 million in the first quarter, more than the two main opposition parties combined.
Under a 37-day election period, parties can spend up to $25-million.
Candidates get an additional $2,700 a day to add to their usual limit of approximately $100,000.
The Canadian Taxpayers Federation is arguing that the reimbursements should be lower, as well as the tax credits for donations to political parties.
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If Trans-Pacific Partnership talks do spill into the campaign window, officially known as the writ period, thorny political issues would become that much more sensitive, said Ottawa trade consultant Adam Taylor.
